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Boy admits using pen with pinhole camera to film girls in school toilet

SINGAPORE — A 17-year-old boy confessed on Wednesday (Nov 17) to taping a pen with a pinhole camera to a cubicle door to film his schoolmates using the toilet last year. He also admitted to filming upskirt videos of women at MRT stations on the escalator and sending one such clip to a classmate.

SINGAPORE — A 17-year-old boy confessed on Wednesday (Nov 17) to taping a pen with a pinhole camera to a cubicle door to film his schoolmates using the toilet last year.

He also admitted to filming upskirt videos of women at MRT stations on the escalator and sending one such clip to a classmate.

The boy pleaded guilty on Wednesday to two counts of voyeurism and one of distributing voyeuristic material.

Another charge each of criminal trespass and voyeurism will be taken into consideration during sentencing. 

He cannot be named under the Children and Young Persons Act as he is under 18. The names of the victims and the school also cannot be revealed due to a court order protecting the victims’ identities.

The court heard that on Aug 19 last year, the boy taped a black pen with a pinhole camera at the top of a cubicle door in the secondary school’s female toilet. 

Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Ng Jean Ting said that he had intended to retrieve the pen the next day.

Later that day, a schoolmate spotted the pen after using the toilet and found it unusual that it would be affixed there. 

Upon closer inspection, she saw the camera lens at the top of the pen and the memory card embedded in it. 

She then removed the pen and handed it to one of the vice-principals of the school. The school’s discipline master later made a police report.

DPP Ng added that since 2019, the boy had also filmed “a few” upskirt videos of women at MRT stations using his mobile phone. 

The boy’s lawyer Audrey Koo called for a report to assess whether he is suitable for probation. 

DPP Ng did not object, noting the importance of rehabilitation given his young age.

Ms Koo of law firm Populus Law Corporation said that the boy has been attending counselling at a care centre and has a close relationship with his family. 

His parents, she added, are more than willing to step up their supervision of him.

Ms Koo also said that this was his first brush with the law.

District Judge Kessler Soh called for a probation suitability report.

The boy remains out on S$5,000 bail and is set to return to court on Dec 15 for sentencing.

For voyeurism, he could be jailed up to two years, fined, caned or punished with any combination of the three.

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crime court student toilet upskirt voyeurism spy cam

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